Dark One Lies, Dark One Tricks
by sandra70
Summary: A little 5x11 speculation. Does Dark Killian have a secret agenda, and will his family find out?


The first thing Emma feels when she plunges the curved blade of Excalibur in the Dark One's body is a mighty rippling running through her own, beginning at her hands, like an electrical shock. Her head is spinning, and suddenly she feels part of her magic leave her. She stumbles, and the only reason she doesn't fall to the ground is that her father is at her side, firmly gripping her elbow. Then everything is happening very fast, accompanied by deafening noise - whirling, swooshing, screeching - as one former Dark One after the other simply dissolves. She has made it. She has destroyed the darkness. By killing the man she loves. Only that man, he wasn't there any more - she already killed him the day in a field of flowers when she turned him into the most vicious Dark One to ever exist. _She_ is responsible for this.

Now he's lying on the ground, defeated, eyes squeezed shut, bleeding to death from a wound inflicted by the very blade that created him. He's still there, him being the last Dark One to be born he will also be the last to leave. The darkness clings to his body, but she can see it seeping through his pores. Never has she felt that much pain in her life. And then he opens his eyes and looks at her. Pain contorts his still handsome features when he tries to speak.

"You did it," he croaks, and she presses her lips together to keep herself from sobbing.

"You left me no choice," she replies flatly, and then the most disturbing thing happens.

A thin line of blood trickles from the corner of his beautiful mouth as he purses his lips into a smile. He should be angry for being thwarted, not smiling. "Good girl," he presses through clenched teeth, "well done. I knew you could do it."

Her eyes widen, and quickly she exchanges a glance with her father; David's face is mirroring the confusion she feels. She takes a step nearer and fixes her eyes on his devastatingly blue ones. Her lips move automatically. "What?"

His voice sounds more and more fragile, his superhuman strength having left him already, and the remnants of his human strength fading away. "Snuff out the darkness." He speaks very carefully, as if he's afraid he could forget a word. "You just needed a push… in the right direction." Moving his head would obviously be too much of a strain, and so he just turns his eyes to David and then back to Emma, and suddenly, _oh God_ , suddenly she understands. The shock hits her right in the pit of her stomach with brutal force.

She repeats the words she already said to him once, back in Camelot. "You played me _the whole time?_ " Her voice is completely bewildered.

He raises an eyebrow and actually smirks, sending more blood trickling down his chin, and this - _this_ is pure Killian Jones: teasing, dashing rapscallion. "Dark One lies, Dark One tricks," he says, and she drops to her knees by his side, not even realizing that she's wearing her red leather jacket and blue jeans again. Nobody is trying to stop her: this almost dead man is a threat to no one now. "Nothing more of that now," he continues with great effort, "thanks to you, Swan." She has no words yet, so she just reaches for his hand with her own and presses it, but his response is very feeble. There's no strength in his grip, it's like he's saving up all the little energy that's still left in him for these last precious words.

David steps forward, standing by their side now, shaking his head as he looks down at his former enemy become ally, his friend. "You were never gonna hurt us," he says incredulously.

Killian actually _chuckles_ , even if it has him flinch in pain. "Would've been... bad form, mate," his words are barely intelligible now. "We were almost... family." His eyelids flutter and the alredy feeble press of his fingers becomes even more limp, and Emma knows she is losing him, again. Tears are streaming down her face.

"Killian!" she cries out and clenches her fingers around his, her grip slippery because of the blood, and David drops to his knees beside her, cradling the dying man's head in his hands, like he's already done once before.

"Not _almost_ , you son of a bitch!" he growls, absurdly angry, and Killian's lips twitch into a smile. "You don't get to sneak away just like that."

Killian swallows and blinks, fixing his gaze on Emma one more time. He opens his mouth, but when he realizes his voice will fail him, he doesn't try to force more words out. She doesn't need to be burdened with the memory of his breaking voice fading away with the last tendrils of darkness leaving his body. So he just smiles and presses her fingers with all that he has, his eyes conveying the words for him. His Swan looks devastated, full of despair and pain, broken - but she also looks like herself again. The last thing he notices that her soft, golden hair is back and also her red leather jacket. No darkness left. After three centuries of him trying in vain, the demon has finally been killed. And his Swan is alive and pure and _home_ with her family, and that is all he needs to know.

Killian Jones dies with a smile on his face.

Emma cries out in pain when his eyelids flutter shut and stay shut this time. David is still shaking his head in disbelief, looking down at Killian's pale face. The other bystanders are quiet, only a muffled sob from Mary Margaret cuts through the silence. Before anyone can say a word, a loud noise fills the air like a thousand thunderstorms, and then the Fury is there, reaching out for Killian's lifeless body, lifting him from the ground.

"No!" Emma yells, clinging to his hand, "I'm not allowing this!" It's a matter of seconds before she can feel herself almost being lifted from the ground along with him. Mary Margaret and Regina come running.

"Emma, no!" Her father grips her other arm. "You have to let him go!"

"I won't!" she screeches like a madwoman, very much a Fury herself now.

"You have to!" David repeats firmly and yanks at her, so that Killian's hand slips out of her grip, and the Fury carries him away. In the blink of an eye, it is all over. Emma turns to her father, her face a grimace of madness, and he grabs her shoulders and shakes her. "Emma! Look at me!" She goes all rigid in his grip, and then her mother is by her side to help steady her. David leans forward and bores his eyes into hers. "This time," he says, "we're doing it the right way. _Together_." He looks at the others, and Mary Margaret nods firmly through her tears. Regina rolls her eyes - her suspiciously glittering eyes - and huffs in agreement.

Henry steps forward, and Emma's eyes fly to him, and when he speaks she feels for the first time how her panic subsides a little and is replaced by something else. _Determination._ The boy nods firmly. "We're gonna need a name."


End file.
